Kept my interest until the last third.. the 'climax' felt underwhelming and a bit disappointed after reading Ararat.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press as well as the author for this ARC in exchange for my honest review.
#NetGalley #AllHallows #St.Martin’sPress #ChristopherGolden

Hear that? That’s the sound of my mind being blown by this amazing book. This is the first book I’ve read by this author but it definitely won’t be the last. This story has everything from ghosts to monsters to human monsters. My only complaint is that I can only read it for the first time once.
It’s Halloween night in 1964 and several families on Parmenter Road are getting ready for the holiday in one way or another. Some are excited and some not so excited. Barb Sweeney has had it with her cheating husband while Rick and Tony Barbosa are both celebrating and mourning their last Halloween before they’re being forced to leave their beloved home. There is a large cast of characters here and each has a different story to tell. They will all converge, however, as they fight an ancient evil. It may not be the one they think though.
This book is told from several different points of view over the course of one Halloween night. Each character is introduced to one of the children at different times. Each is in some type of vintage costume. Each is terrified of the one they call The Cunning Man. Each begs a different resident of Parmenter Road for shelter until midnight. Midnight is when they’ll be safe. We become attached to each member of the neighborhood and grow to care about them despite their faults and differences. Even the worst of the characters has a redeeming quality. This was one of my favorite aspects of this book. I cared deeply about every character, even the worst of them. They’re all united against one common enemy, but it’s not the one they think.
Honestly, the only thing negative that can be said about this book is that it would have been more effective if it came out in October. It so perfectly captures the feel of Halloween night that I could practically smell the leaves and hear the screams.
All in all, this is just about a perfect book. I really hope that it gets made into a movie or tv show. It would be amazing on screen!

Just so you know— you will definitely see this book on my Halloween Reading List!!

If I may, I’d just say that the first few chapters are world-building but not very complex, its more domestic thriller type building that every reader will enjoy. There are some 80’s era references that I enjoyed reading! The second half of the book is just pure horror-fun!!

The story is about protecting children on Halloween from The Cunning Man. Always remember—any story with “Man” is creepy. The supernatural element is just bonus in this scary drama!!

Thank you SMP for the gifted ebook

"…the static seemed to claw at the music, tear it up. Another voice broke in, like the ghost of one radio station overlapping with Kiss 108. But this wasn’t the voice of Sunny Joe White. The voice sounded like someone amused, caught in the middle of telling a joke, but then it changed, as if the man had something caught in his throat. The sound was awful, almost hateful, like an animal . . . and then it was just static again. Barb twisted the dial, trying to tune back in to Kiss, but all that came out was static and squealing, so she jabbed the power knob and the inside of the car went silent."
--------------------------------------
"Nothing in these woods could be more dreadful, more terrifying, than the selfish cruelty of ordinary people."

Coventry, MA may be an appealing looking place, and there are some good things happening there, involving some good people, but below the mask of 1984 suburban bliss there lie some darker realities. And over the course of a single Halloween night there will be a cornucopia of revelation. (A Masque of the Orange Death?) As in Poe’s story, there is no refuge from what is coming, and there will be a hefty body count.

Tony Barbosa is a decent guy. Not hugely successful in the world. Just found a job after a long spell out of work. About to sell the family house, the damage from that prolonged unemployment. He puts on a Halloween tradition on his property every year, The Haunted Woods, with all the things one might expect. Sadly, this will be his last time. Daughter, Chloe, 17, loves helping out. His wife, Alice, puts up with it, and his son, Rick, 13, is simply uninterested. He will hang with his friend, Billie, a rare black girl in this area. Tony and Alice are just emerging from a rough patch. The future of their marriage is shaky. On this Halloween night, there will be a whole lotta shakin’ goin’ on.

Attorney Donnie Sweeney is a drunken, philandering pathetic excuse of a husband, reliably unreliable, a chronic liar. His wife, Barb, is reaching her limit with him. ("Everyone loved Donnie Sweeney, but nobody more than Donnie himself, and for the first time, Charlie wondered if that wasn’t his dad’s defining characteristic. He loved his wife and his kids right up to the moment it threatened his ability to have a good time.") Their kids are a surprisingly decent lot, 18yo Julia, 13yo Brian, and Charlie, 11. Really, dude, you cannot simply put your scattered crap back in the garage and shut the garage door, on a weekend, but take off to do whatever, sticking your kids with the task?

In addition to these two families we follow Vanessa Montez, 17, and her bff, Steve Koenig, 16 Both are crushing on the same girl.

Trick-or-treaters are making the rounds, but there are some unfamiliar faces among the crowd tonight. A young-looking (nine, maybe) girl in a rough, old-time Raggedy Ann outfit. A teenaged scarecrow, his costume also seeming to be from another era, and a very pale boy named Leonard. Definitely not a trick-or-treater is the man they say they are fleeing, Mr. Cunning. They beg the local kids to stay with them, to protect them, until midnight, when the coast should be clear. Um, ok, sure, whatever. It is clear, though, that there is something strange in the neighborhood. A giant blackthorn tree appears, and a new (popup?) clearing in the woods. There is hunting going on.

There are two levels to this one, the presenting horror, which is pretty bloody horrifying, and the underlying horrors, also pretty bloody horrifying, but in a different way. In a 2014 interview with Nightmare Magazine, Golden said, "I’m not just fascinated with monsters, but with monstrosity, both human and—in the way it reflects back the human—supernatural." There is a considerable volume of monstrosity in Coventry, hidden, or at least not publicly professed by the residents. A relatively-recently-arrived couple are suspected of dark doings. Are those suspicions accurate or just speculative hyperbole? Donnie’s low character is not exactly a state secret, but his charming mask will not hide him tonight. Bigotries will be exposed. But there is mask-dropping that will be benign, as some folks allow their true selves be seen, to positive effect.

The strength of the novel for me was its portrayal of middle-class duress. Tony Barbosa’s situation wandered queasily close to home. Everybody seems on the cusp of change. Troubled marriages abound. The adult women are given prime roles, their life goals, and marital experiences portrayed evenly with their mates’. Ditto the interactions among the teens and kids, wrestling with changes in their lives, moving from kid to adolescent, from adolescent to something more, discovering and molding who they are or want to be. The strength of Golden’s kid portrayals reminded me very much of Stephen King. There is an element of nostalgia for the 1980s here, but a much larger perspective on a place and time that is portrayed as far from appealing.

There were some aspects that I thought did not work quite so well. While it was possible to follow the many characters tracked here, there seemed rather a lot of them for a book of modest length. Chapters are short and offer alternating viewpoints. There are sixty two chapters in a book of three-hundred-thirty-six pages, so if you are inclined, you can read this one in small bits. Four characters get the most ink. Barb Sweeney gets ten chapters, Tony Barbosa and Vanessa get nine each, and Rick Barbosa gets eight. One character gets four chapters, two get three chapters, one gets two and five other characters get one chapter apiece. The character voices are distinct and Golden goes into sufficient depth with the majors to gain our interest.

Also, I found the layering of the supernatural evil excessive. And the back-and-forth struggle of one character to gain control inside a terrible space just seemed, even within the confines of a fantasy, a bit much. The gruesomeness worked well, offering shocking turns and some surprise demises.

There is persistent creepiness, ramping up from shadows, noises, and fleeting images to more direct darkness and considerable bloodshed.

By the end of the night, many truths will be revealed, facades of all sorts will be ripped off or tossed aside, many lives will have ended and many others will have been permanently changed. The line between a good scare and good, people-centered storytelling has never been thinner. All Hallows is a scary good read.

"Something moved in the forest. A deeper shadow, back in among the trees. Vanessa narrowed her eyes, trying to focus, but someone said something funny and everyone laughed and she pretended to have heard the joke and laughed along with them, and the moment passed.

Still, something in the air had changed. The night seemed darker, as if the moonlight sifting through the branches had dimmed. The shadows had turned weird, the clearing a bit smaller, closer. This time when her skin prickled, it wasn’t from the flush that Julia made her feel, but from the way the night seemed to hold its breath."

Review posted - 01/24/23

Publication date – 02/10/23


I received a digital ARE of All Hallows from St. Martin’s Press in return for a fair review, and the offering of a few Druid prayers. Thanks, folks, and thanks to NetGalley for facilitating.

For a more complete version of this review, with links, and proper formatting, please head over to my site - https://cootsreviews.com/2023/02/10/all-hallows-by-christopher-golden/

All Hallows is a mesh up of neighborhood drama and horror. The first half draws mainly on neighborhood drama and wow is there drama! Even though the book is set in the 1980s, other than the lack of cell phones, it feels more current day than then and the drama highlights that more than the drama. There are a couple cute obscure 80s references, but the drama is more current day. And honestly, it was over the top. It had a lot of shock value that really took away from the overall horror that was about to take place. That all begins in the second half and it is scary! The descriptions really make the horror jump off the page! I got chills! The pace really picks up from there and landslides to the end, which is well done and left me gasping! I would love more horror and less drama!

There's an excellent concept here, but it feels incredibly long. The various POVs are interesting at first but they very quickly become unwieldy, and by the 65% mark, they are actively hindering the book's pacing.

The book begins well but doesn't stick the landing for me. Too many moving parts, too many POVs, and a plodding place kill it for me.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me with a free galley in exchange for an honest review.

3.5

A promising book that boiled down to familial drama. I was expecting this to be more horror centered than it was. While the last approximately 25% did have that horror I was hoping for, everything else revolved around suburban drama; which I wouldn't mind if that was what was advertised. I liked that not much of the monster was revealed, making it scarier. Based on this book, I'd most likely read more by the author because the writing was great. Not entirely a book for me, but definitely something I'd recommend.

All Hallows
⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Genre: Thriller
Format: Kindle eBook
Date Published: 1/24/23
Author: Christopher Golden
Publisher: St. Martin’s Press
Pages: 336
GR: 3.62

I requested a digital advanced readers copy from NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press and providing my opinion voluntarily and unbiased.

My Thoughts: I became a fan of Christopher Golden with The Road of Bones and will read anything he writes, this one does not disappoint. The story takes place in 1984 on Halloween night. The Barbosa’s host their final haunted woods, a tradition that is coming an end. The Koenig’s will also be hosing a Halloween Party. Not to mention the usually kids going trick r treating through Parmenter Road. I love the nostalgic 80’s sprinkled throughout the story. Weaved into the story is the tale of the “cunning man,” which is creepy all on its own.

The story is narrated by multiple characters, on Halloween night, through their POV. Even with the surplus of characters, it was not hard to keep up with the characters. The characters were developed well with depth, creepiness, mysterious, and creative. The author’s writing style was complex, suspenseful, packed the horror, and kept me invested cover to cover.

For me, this story packed in creepiness, it was dark and disturbing, and the perfect book to read for Halloween. It had an aspect of Stranger Things going on. Suspension of belief is not a problem for me, especially with Golden’s writing. For the last 30-40% of this book, I was on the edge of my seat. I would highly recommend picking up the book or the audiobook on this one.

It’s been a while since I’ve read a Christopher Golden novel, and now I’m asking myself why.

One neighbor having a big Halloween Party, another hosting the last year of the Haunted Woods display, kids trick-or-treating – Parmenter Road is the place to be on Halloween. But those that survive the night will change their minds the next morning and count themselves lucky to be alive.

This is the type of neighborhood where everyone knows your business – or at least they think they do – and rumors abound. Most have some truth behind them. Many of these characters display some of the worst human traits – infidelity, alcoholism, pedophilia, bigotry, and homophobia to name a few And that’s in addition to The Cunning Man and the strange children combing the neighborhood that night. There’s certainly no shortage of horrors in this novel.

With multiple POVs (more than eight adults and teens), it was a little difficult to keep up at first. With each character dealing with their own perilous circumstances, it didn’t take long to distinguish between them. I love the setting – Halloween night in the mid 80s, a fairly small neighborhood surrounded by a forest, creepy children running around begging other kids to shelter them until midnight – it’s perfect. Honestly, I’m surprised this didn’t release in the fall instead of January. Several reviewers struggled with pacing, but I didn’t mind the slower pace in this case, and most of the story takes place in one night.

As a warning there are gory, disturbing, and heartbreaking scenes alike, so be prepared. Some aren’t for the faint of heart. This may be more of a slow-burn horror story, but I plowed through it in two sittings. This much time between Golden novels won’t happen again.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I was really looking forward to a good scare, however this just didn’t deliver for me.

The book seems solely focused on neighborhood drama and very little emphasis was placed on the children that didn’t belong and the cunning man.

It wasn’t very scary and honestly was very scattered with all of the different POVs.

With no clear protagonist and no clear direction to the story I was left a little disappointed.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced ebook copy.

Had an enjoyable time reading this book.

All Hallows is my favorite Christopher Golden book yet, and that’s saying a lot as I’ve loved everything he’s written. This was like Stranger Things meets the original Halloween in the best possible way. Super fun, fast-paced, with a great supernatural element woven in. 4.5 stars rounded up to 5.

Thank you netgalley for the chance to read this super creepy book!! this book is so gripping and very well written!

Halloween is my favorite holiday. I love the candy, costumes and screams of joy and terror. Id decorate for it all year if it wasn’t frowned upon by my neighbors. So of course I had to read All Hallows by Christopher Golden.
Golden transports us back to October, and the magic of Halloween. But not just any Halloween, it’s Halloween in the 1980s. This was my childhood. We had homemade costumes made with stray crafting supplies, or store bought uncomfortable plastic masks that you were forced to smell your own breath in. We didn’t use pillowcases to get our candy, we had hard plastic pumpkins that filled up after one block of scavenging. Golden captured my Halloweens in this book, but also revealed my nightmares.
What if there were real monsters trick or treating with unsuspecting children. How would you be able to tell? Some costumes are so believable, the look real. In this book, those little monsters are horrible and blood thirsty. It’s a scartastic delight of horror.
I flew through this book. The many perspectives of holiday revelries propelled the story at a fast pace. Each character was connected, their encounters with evil intertwined. I couldn’t put it down.
Celebrate Halloween all year, with All Hallows. It’s worth the terror.

Christopher Golden is one of my favorite authors. Road of Bones was in my top 3 books of 2022 and All Hallows will probably be in the top of my 2023. I loved the setting and the creep factor. This is the perfect Halloween read and I am honestly kinda bummed that I read it this far out from Halloween. All of the characters are so vivid and real. I loved getting to know all of them and was so sad for some of their fates. You can recognize real people you know in the faces of the characters and the way that he writes the story from everyone's perspective was perfect.

And the dark supernatural monster thing was awesome. I was ready for some crazy supernatural stuff because I read road of bones but he outdid himself here. It was so amazing and I couldn't wait to finish this story. I cannot wait to get more from this truly amazing horror author.

This was a short and sweet nostalgic coming of age story set on Halloween. I enjoyed some of the 80s references but this novel needed more plot.

Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher.

My first Golden book. Somehow our paths never crossed. It was good, but not a favorite in horror genres.

The story takes on Halloween. It's a neighborhood filled with children and parents ready to enjoy the holiday. And something sinister starts to walk among them. The story does focus a lot of characters (and there are a lot of them), and their darker sides. We get a lot of bigotry, racism, judgement, cheating. It shared the ugly side of this particular neighborhood. Add the evil that stalks the children and we have a horror book in the making.

The end had the halloween slasher vibes, with bodies piling up left and right. It did have a couple of redemptive arcs, but in the end it was too many POVs to build the suspense and induce horror. I felt it dragged through.

It was very cinematic, and with the slasher vibes towards the end, would make a great horror movie.

Thank you to St Martins press and Netgalley for my review copy.

This one's hard for me to rate. I thoroughly enjoyed the first half of this book - I mean absolutely loved it. The 80s nostalgia, the gradual building of tension - both underlying creep factor and literal tension boiling over in the form of physical fights erupting between otherwise civil neighbors, secrets being exposed, etc, and the general sense of unease in that something is obviously not right with this situation, but I can't quite put my finger on what it is kind of unease. But then the second half started to get just weird and a little too silly for me with the plot line. It became way too far fetched and turned what I would call paranormal / sci-fi on me, which I am not so much of a fan of. I won't say more so as not to give it away, but I was just disappointed with the direction it ultimately took. I did like the very end and the sort of clean wrap-up, or as tidy as it could possibly be, but a quick "where are they now" epilogue would have been even nicer. If you like paranormal / sci-fi horror, you will probably LOVE this. If you're looking for more of a psychological thriller, I'm not sure. The writing and character development were excellent though. I was definitely attached to most of the characters by the time the extended climax began. I'm giving this 3 stars, but it's probably a little more than that. Like I said, the first half was gripping.

This is the perfect Halloween read. The book takes place on Halloween night in 1984 in a town in Massachusetts. There is a lot of drama going on among multiple families and neighbors within the town. Also, there is the “Cunning Man” and the creepy kids that appeared out of nowhere who are afraid of him. Will the town be able to survive this Halloween night?

There are a lot of characters…a lot. Surprisingly I wasn’t confused and was able to keep all the characters straight. It was a creepy book and I loved that it took place both in the eighties and on Halloween night. I enjoyed the supernatural element of the “Cunning Man” and the “creepy kids.” My only complaint was I thought it was a little too slow, it took a while for all the action and “horror” parts, but once it did it was a wild ride.

When I read the synopsis of All Hallows, I knew it was outside my typical read, but it sounded interesting and I wanted to give it a try. I'm glad I tried something new, but this book just wasn't for me. I've realized that I am not a fan of supernatural books, and I could not get into this one.

In addition to the supernatural elements, there was WAY too much going on in this book. There was a lot of drama for a story told over a few hours, and it was hard to keep track of everything. And the new suspicious neighbors that everyone is afraid of...?! That plot line was not necessary and didn't add anything to the story, in my opinion. (I can't be more specific without giving a spoiler).

Overall, if you're a fan of horror and supernatural thrillers, then this one might be for you!

Thank you Netgalley and St. Martin's Press for my gifted copy in exchange for an honest review.